Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms. To create this book, Newton used his knowledge in
astronomy to find dates of Egyptian, Greek, Hebrew, and mythology events.
Another of his books was the Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy,
better know as the Principia. [picture G, Importance of Isaac Newton, 54] This book
talks about physics, the laws of motion, laws of gravity, and tides. Benard Cohen said,
?It is one of the most profound revolutions in the history of human thought.? (Hitzeroth
and Leon, 54) The Principia was written for the Royal Society (Hitzeroth and Leon, 53)
When the Royal Society received the book, the president and past enemy Hooke found
the book disturbing. It disturbed him because it had no mention of his findings.
(Hitzeroth and Leon, 53) Newton then wrote to a friend that Hooke didn?t deserve any
mention: all of the work was completely Newton?s (Hitzeroth and Leon, 53).
After writing the Principia Newton received great grief from the community
(Hitzeroth and Leon, 54). Hardly anyone could understand his writings. Newton
couldn?t understand why people couldn?t understand them. He commented, ?The
principles of my theory are within the intellectual grasp even of those who are
unacquainted with the higher mathematics.? (Hitzeroth and Leon, 55). This
misunderstanding from the community was just the beginning of his nervous breakdown.
Other factors were the death of his mother, then four other close friends passing away
within a close time period (Hitzeroth and Leon, 58) Another idea on how his nervous
breakdown occurred was a fire he accidentally started. This fire burned a great number
of some very important research papers (Hitzeroth and Leon, 63). His breakdown led
him away from his studies and into a less strenuous line of work. He began to work at a
mint as the warden.
When coins where made in Newton?s age, the coin was made of the actual
valuable metal. Because of this, people would shave edges off the coins and then pass
them on. This eventually caused horrible arguments between buyers and sellers.
Newton?s job was to watch over the workers at the mint and others in the city and
attempt to catch the people doing this illegal act. [picture H, Importance of Isaac
Newton, 64]
Later he was promoted to the position of master of the mint. This occurred
during King William?s Recoinage. The Recoinage was the attempt to collect all coins,
melt them down, and create new coins to end the confusion. Newton was in charge of
this task. It was vital to England?s economy to get this done quickly (Hitzeroth and Leon,
65). If Newton hadn?t finished the job quickly it could have greatly slowed the country?s
economy down. (Hitzeroth and Leon, 65) Newton accomplished this by making ten more
coin machines and hiring more workers.
While out of his discovery age, Newton became actively involved in the Royal
Society. He became a member in 1672, then was president in 1703. This was made
possible by the death of his long time rival, Hooke (Hitzeroth and Leon).
Although he was mostly done with research, he received a challenge one day from
Johann Bernoulli. The challenge was to find the path, other than a vertical line, in which
a body would fall the fastest. Newton set to this right away and accomplished it
overnight (Hitzeroth and Leon, 68). The solution was a curve called a cycloid. [picture I,
www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/curves/cycloid]
In Newton?s older years he found himself gambling with stocks. His main bid
was a stock called South Sea. He didn?t do very well with his stocks but his other
financial areas of his life made up for it. A man estimated his total earning to be 39,033
pounds (wwwcnl.cem. ch/~mcnab/n/ntm/ntmtxt2.html). With the bad gambling, his
niece said that he had lost over 20,000 pounds, but he didn?t want anyone to know
(wwwcnl.cem.ch/~mcnab/n/ntm/ntmtxt2.html) Dr. Wollaston best sums his problem
with this comment,? In his old age he became a greedy old fool.?
(wwwcnl.cem.ch/~mcnab /n/ntm/ntmtxt2.html). This just goes to show that even the
greatest of minds can be captured by the simplest things.
Even though Newton appeared to have lived a humble life, he still had some great
moments (Hitzeroth and Leon, 72) One you already know, becoming Royal Society
president. Another was being knighted by Queen Anne. The last that was found was
Newton?s visit by Peter the Great on his tour through the West. Though little was know
about their meeting, Peter had turned out to be very pleased with what he learned from
Newton (Hitzeroth and Leon, 71)
In closing the report here is a quote by Alexander Pope that beautifully fits
Newton. ?God said, Let Newton be! and all was light? (www.ihep.
ac.cn/ins/ihep/kepu/Newton/Newton).